Calendar Archive 2015

Bouncing Back: Rewiring the Brain for Resilience and Renewal
Spirit Rock Meditation Center, Woodacre, CA
Saturday, January 10, 2015, 9:30am-5:00pm

Mindfulness and compassion practices are among the most powerful agents of brain change known to modern science. A wise use of Buddhist contemplative practices and tools from modern relational psychology can help practitioners let go of unwholesome coping strategies and cultivate wholesome ones, leading to more clarity, response flexibility and resilience and less greed, hatred, delusion and suffering. This daylong teaches participants many practices that skillfully harness the innate neuroplasticity of the brain to reduce the impacts of stress, trauma, and our all-too- human conditioning on how we cope with the inevitable disappointments and disasters of life, and to deepen the habits of generosity, kindness, compassion, forgiveness, equanimity, tranquility, and inner peace that lead to freedom and liberation. The daylong will deepen practitioners’ experiences of and faith in self-directed neuroplasticity as a genuine support of wise understanding and wise effort.

Mindfulness and Self-Compassion Winter 2015 Advanced Course
Mindfulness and Self-Compassion
January 15 – March 5, 2015, Thursday evenings, 6pm-9pm in San Rafael, CA

For people who have previously completed a Mindful Self-Compassion course with Linda Graham or another MSC teacher, or have practiced loving kindness and/or mindfulness meditation for three years or more. Mindful Self-Compassion is an 8-week training in empirically-supported tools and techniques that enable participants to respond to difficult moments in their lives with kindness, care, understanding, and wise action. MSC teaches practices of loving connected presence that allows us not just to feel better but to cope wisely when we are feeling bad. 2015 Mindful Self-Compassion trainings will be held Thursday evenings, January 15 – March 5, 2015 in San Rafael, CA. Download the Registration Form for Winter 2015 Advanced Course as PDF Download the Registration Form for Winter 2015 Advanced Course as Word Document

Mindful Self-Compassion: Winter 2015 Core Course
Mindful Self-Compassion
January 18 – March 8, 2015, Sunday evenings, 6pm-9pm in San Rafael, CA

Mindful Self-Compassion is an 8-week training in empirically-supported tools and techniques that enable participants to respond to difficult moments in their lives with kindness, care, understanding, and wise action. MSC teaches practices of loving connected presence that allows us not just to feel better but to cope wisely when we are feeling bad. 2015 Mindful Self-Compassion trainings will be held Sunday evenings, January 18 – March 8, 2015 in San Rafael, CA. Download the Registration Form for Winter 2015 Core Course as PDF Download the Registration Form for Winter 2015 Core Course as Word Document

2015 Deepening Joy Group
Deepening Joy
Friday evenings, 6pm-9pm, January 16 – March 20, 2015 in San Rafael, CA.

Deepening Joy groups provide an opportunity for participants to explore the practices taught in James Baraz’s Awakening Joy course: intention, mindfulness, gratitude, resilience, integrity, letting go, be-friending ourselves, loving others, compassion, equanimity, and simply being. These practices help us move through the difficulties and challenges of being human sustained by an increasingly reliable and deep happiness. The real joy of the groups is the rich resonance that emerges among group members who bring their own wisdom and generosity of heart to the gatherings. The format is opening meditation, check-in, dharma talk and inquiry, experiential exercises and discussion, practice homework, closing meditation.

Finding Joy in Difficult Times
Awakening Joy, Berkeley, CA
Tuesday, March 10, 2015, 7pm-9pm

Awakening Joy is James Baraz’s five month course, live in Berkeley and online internationally, that guides participants in practices that build more resilience, joy and well-being: intention, mindfulness, gratitude, resilience, integrity, letting go, loving ourselves, loving others, compassion, and simply being. Guest teachers, practice letters, conference calls, videos, joy buddies and community forums support participants’ learning.

The Art and Science of Brain Care
Psychotherapy Networker Symposium, Washington, D.C.
Thursday, March 26, 2015, 9:30am-4:30pm

When we tap into the innate neuroplasticity of the brain to reduce stress, regain our equilibrium, and restore perspective and resilience, we can avoid compassion fatigue and burnout and recover the rejuvenating creativity and flow of our work. In this experiential workshop, you will learn empirically validated techniques to calm the nervous system, come to clarity and discernment in decision making, heal toxic shame, retire the inner critic, and revive a sense of competency and connections with others. You’ll leave with a self-help toolkit that will include: * Exercises to help reconfigure and rewire “stuck” brain-behavior patterns, including specific techniques to enhance coping strategies and renew your energy for connecting with others. * Ways to do a “brain tune-up” for balance and well-being. * Ideas about creating a Positivity Portfolio as a means of self-renewal and a way of practicing the art of savoring the moment.

Catalyzing Brain Change
Psychotherapy Networker Symposium, Washington, D.C.
Saturday, March 28, 2015. 11am-5pm

Different kinds of neural activity underlie different levels of client functioning and different paths of therapeutic change. Whether a client is stuck in repetitive defensive patterns, struggling to stabilize a coherent sense of self, progressing incrementally toward new resilient behavior, or experiencing quantum breakthroughs, teaching clients what’s happening in the brain in each of these modes can help us guide their therapeutic growth. In this workshop you will learn to integrate catalysts for neuroplasticity for each of four different learning mechanisms in the brain into your preferred approach You’ll learn how to: * Create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and installs new habits into implicit memory; * Use memory deconsolidation-reconsolidation to heal toxic shame and retire the inner critic; * Strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and coherence; * Harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights to break through.

Catalyze Brain Change: From Incremental Skills to Quantum Learning
Momentous Institute, Dallas, TX
Thursday, April 9, 2015

Different kinds of neural activity underlie different levels of student functioning and different paths of learning. Whether a student is stuck in repetitive, maladaptive coping strategies, struggling to stabilize a coherent sense of self, progressing incrementally toward new, more resilient behavior, or experience quantum breakthroughs, knowing what’s happening in the brain in each of these modes can help us stabilize their functioning, strengthen their resilience, and improve their learning. In this session you will learn how to:

Create the “left shift” that can counterbalance the brain’s negativity bias and install new habits into implicit memory
Use memory deconsolidation-reconsolidation to heal toxic shame and retire the inner critic
Strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to strengthen student resiliency and coherence
Harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights to break through.

Shift Happens
YogaKula, Berkeley, CA
April 15, 2015, 7:30pm-9:30pm

Mindfulness and compassion practices are among the most powerful agents of brain change known to modern science. We can learn to wisely use Buddhist contemplative practices and tools from modern relational psychology to harness the innate neuroplasticity of the brain to reduce the impacts of stress and trauma, deepen our self-compassion and self-awareness, learn new and creative ways to navigate the twists and turns of life with more calm, courage, and flexibility, and deepen the wise effort that leads to inner peace, equanimity, and well-being.

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience of Resilience and Well-Being
Sonoma State University
Tuesday, April 28, 2015

[closed to enrollees of The Psychology of Self-Discovery class.] Dealing effectively with the challenges and crises of life is the core of our resilience and well-being. Helping our students develop flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is the heart of the counseling process. Modern neuroscience is discovering how the brain encodes its strategies of coping in the first place, and illuminates how we can help students use their own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire strategies that no longer work so well, even strengthen the structures of the brain that develop rather than derail our resilience. We can help students reverse the impact of stress and trauma, come out of anxiety, depression, addictions, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, and rewire the inner critic.We can help them connect to inner resources and to the relationships that are healthy and nourishing, and through mindful awareness and reflection discern options and make wise choices.

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience of Resilience and Well-Being
Troubled Youth Conference, Salt Lake City, UT
May 7, 2015

Dealing effectively with the challenges and crises of life is the core of our resilience and well-being. Helping our students develop flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is the heart of the counseling process. Modern neuroscience is discovering how the brain encodes its strategies of coping in the first place, and illuminates how we can help students use their own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire strategies that no longer work so well, even strengthen the structures of the brain that develop rather than derail our resilience. We can help students reverse the impact of stress and trauma, come out of anxiety, depression, addictions, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, and rewire the inner critic.We can help them connect to inner resources and to the relationships that are healthy and nourishing, and through mindful awareness and reflection discern options and make wise choices.

Brain Care: The Neuroscience of Self-Care
Esalen Institute, Big Sur, CA
May 8-10, 2015

When we nourish and replenish our brains, we are nourishing and replenishing ourselves. When we tap into the innate neuroplasticity of the brain to reduce stress, regain our equilibrium, and restore perspective and resilience, we can avoid compassion fatigue and burnout and recover the rejuvenating creativity and flow in our lives. In this experiential workshop, you will learn dozens of techniques to calm down the nervous system, come to clarity and discernment in decision making, heal toxic shame, retire the inner critic, and revive a sense of competency and connection with others. You will be taught how to: * Create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and installs new wholesome habits into implicit memory; * Strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and coherence; * harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights and aha’s to break through.

Brain Care is Self Care
Kripalu, Stockbridge, MA
May 15-17, 2015

Create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and installs new wholesome habits into implicit memory;
Strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and coherence;
harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights and aha’s to break through.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring Your Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
leadingedgeseminars.org
May 19-20, 2014, 9:00am-4:30pm

In his forward to Bouncing Back, Rick Hanson exclaims that “Linda Graham has distilled a lifetime of clinical practice and deep reflection into an eminently useful guide…a groundbreaking integration of ancient contemplative wisdom, relational psychology, and modern neuroscience.” In this two-day workshop, Linda will explore how to help clients develop flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters. This workshop will teach you how to harness the brain’s own mechanisms of change to help your clients rewire coping strategies that are defensive, dysfunctional, and inhibiting growth. You will learn techniques that help your clients encode new more flexible patterns of response. Modern neuroscience is teaching us how to use the brain’s innate neuroplasticity to rewire coping behaviors, even when they are seemingly “stuck” and intractable. You will learn tools and techniques of brain change to help clients use their own self-directed neuroplasticity to: reverse the impact of stress and trauma; regulate the emotions that arise from anxiety, depression, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame; deepen the self-compassion and empathy that connect them to their inner resources; overcome resistance and strengthen the resonant relationships that foster resilience; and shift their perspectives through mindful awareness and reflection to discern options and make wise choices. You Will Learn:

3 mechanisms of brain change to install new, more resilient patterns of behavior into implicit memory
Body-based tools to regulate automatic survival responses and return the body-brain to its natural physiological baseline equilibrium
How to use memory deconsolidation-reconsolidation to heal toxic shame and retire the inner critic;
How to cultivate positive emotions to create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and primes the brain for learning and growth;
How to use empathy and attunement to strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and recover a client’s inner secure base;
Skills of relational intelligence
How to harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights to break through.

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience Of Resilience And Well-Being
Earthrise Retreat Center, Petaluma, CA
May 29-31, 2015

Welcome to an experiential weekend of strengthening your inner resources and the natural resilience that supports your well-being and flourishing. You’ll learn more than a dozen tools and techniques – drawn from the intersection of brain science, relational psychology, and mindfulness practices – that will help you reduce the impact of stress and trauma, deepen your self-compassion and self-awareness, and broaden perspectives, possibilities, and sense of purpose. The practical experiential exercises, guided meditations and visualizations, inquiry in dyads and small groups, and stimulating dialogue and discussion in large groups, will help you harness your own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire your brain for maximum resilience and well-being.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring the Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
Spirit Rock Meditation Center
June 6, 2015, 9:30am – 5:00pm

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience of Resilience and Well-Being
Authentic Leadership in Action, keynote, Tacoma, WA
Friday, June 12, 2015

Modern neuroscience is discovering how the brain encodes its strategies of coping in the first place, and illuminates how we can use our own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire strategies that no longer work so well, even strengthen the structures of the brain that develop rather than derail our resilience.

We can choose new experiences that create new neural structure and rewire old neural circuitry, strengthening the 6 C’s of coping: calm, compassion, clarity, connections, competence, and courgage. We can learn to reverse the impact of stress and trauma, come out of anxiety, depression, addictions, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, and rewire the inner critic. We can help them connect to inner resources and to the relationships that are healthy and nourishing, and through mindful awareness and reflection, discern options and make wise choices.

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience of Resilience and Well-Being
Omega Institute, Rhinebeck, NY
July 3-5, 2015

Welcome to an experiential weekend of strengthening your inner resources and the natural resilience that supports your well-being and flourishing. You’ll be taught more than a dozen tools and techniques drawn from the intersection of brain science, relational psychology, and mindfulness practices. These can help you reduce the impact of stress and trauma, deepen your self-compassion and self-awareness, and broaden perspectives, possibilities, and sense of purpose. The practical experiential exercises, guided meditations and visualizations, inquiry in dyads and small groups, and stimulating dialogue and discussion in large groups, will help you harness your own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire your brain for maximum resilience and well-being. You can learn new and creative ways to navigate the twists and turns of life with more calm, courage, and flexibility.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring Your Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
San Leandro Public Library San Leandro, CA
July 9, 2015, 6pm-8pm

Resilience is the innate capacity to respond flexibly to the hiccups and hurricanes of life. Discoveries in modern brain science help us integrate tools from relational psychology and mindfulness practice to efficiently harness the neuroplasticity of the brain to rewire old patterns of coping and bounce back better from difficulties, disappointments, and disasters. In this program, you will learn empirically validated techniques to reduce stress, take self-compassion breaks, come to clarity and discernment in decision making, retire the inner critic, and revive a sense of competency and connection with others. You’ll learn to create new neural flexibility in your brain and a fresh sense of well-being and flourishing.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring Your Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
Institute of Noetic Sciences Conference, Chicago, IL
July 24-25, 2015

When we tap into the innate neuroplasticity of the brain to reduce stress, regain our equilibrium, and restore perspectives and discernment, we strengthen the inner resources and natural resilience that supports well-being and flourishing. In this workshop, you will learn more than a dozen tools and techniques drawn from the intersection of brain science, relational psychology, and mindfulness practices to reduce the impact of stress and trauma, deepen self-compassion and self-awareness, revive a sense of competency and connection with others, and broaden perspectives, possibilities, and sense of purpose. You will learn how to:

Create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias
Heal toxic shame and retire the inner critic
Strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and coherence;
Harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights and aha’s to break through.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring the Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
Cape Cod Institute
July 27-31, 2015

Dealing effectively with challenges and crises in life is the core of resilience and well-being. Helping clients develop flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is the heart of the therapeutic process. Helping clients harness the brain’s own mechanisms of change to rewire coping strategies that are defensive, dysfunctional, and blocking of growth, and to encode new more flexible patterns of response, is the focus of this workshop. Modern neuroscience is teaching us how to use the brain’s innate neuroplasticity to rewire coping behaviors, even when they are seemingly “stuck” and intractable. Clinicians will learn through didactics, experiential exercises, and group discussions, which tools and techniques of brain change best help clients use their own self-directed neuroplasticity reverse the impact of stress and trauma, regulate surges of emotions to come out of anxiety, depression, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, deepen the self-compassion and empathy that connect them to their inner resources, overcome resistance and strengthen the resonant relationships that foster the perseverance that develops resilience, and shift their perspectives through mindful awareness and reflection to discern options and make wise choices. Participants will learn to apply these tools and techniques, which underlie the therapeutic modalities they are already familiar with – Internal Family Systems, Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, AEDP. DBT, EFT – to help clients strengthen the 6 C’s of Coping: Calm, Compassion, Clarity, Connections, Competence and Courage and recover the natural resilience that supports well-being and flourishing. Clinicians will also learn to apply these tools to their own brain care as self-care to avoid compassion fatigue and burnout.Create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and installs new wholesome habits into implicit memory.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring the Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
Kassan Associates, Brisbane and Melbourne, Australia
September 3-4 and September 7-8, 2015

This workshop will help clinicians explore how to help clients develop flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters. This workshop will teach you how to harness the brain’s own mechanisms of change to help your clients rewire coping strategies that are defensive, dysfunctional, and inhibiting growth. You will learn techniques that help your clients encode new more flexible patterns of response. Modern neuroscience is teaching us how to use the brain’s innate neuroplasticity to rewire coping behaviors, even when they are seemingly “stuck” and intractable. You will learn tools and techniques of brain change to help clients use their own self-directed neuroplasticity to: reverse the impact of stress and trauma; regulate the emotions that arise from anxiety, depression, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame; deepen the self-compassion and empathy that connect them to their inner resources; overcome resistance and strengthen the resonant relationships that foster resilience; and shift their perspectives through mindful awareness and reflection to discern options and make wise choices. You Will Learn:

3 mechanisms of brain change to install new, more resilient patterns of behavior into implicit memory
Body-based tools to regulate automatic survival responses and return the body-brain to its natural physiological baseline equilibrium
How to use memory deconsolidation-reconsolidation to heal toxic shame and retire the inner critic;
How to cultivate positive emotions to create the “left shift” that counter-balances the brain’s negativity bias and primes the brain for learning and growth;
How to use empathy and attunement to strengthen the executive functioning of the pre-frontal cortex to build resilience and recover a client’s inner secure base;
Skills of relational intelligence
How to harness the mental play space of the default network to allow insights to break through.

Shift Happens
Mindful Awareness Research Center, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
Saturday, September 26, 2015, 10am-4pm

Changing Brains, Changing Lives
Aspen Strong Symposium, Aspen, CO
October 5-6, 2015

Early attachment experiences teach children basic coping strategies for dealing with adversity and difficulties in life; they also develop (or de-rail) the structures in the brain we need to learn more resilient coping strategies later on. Modern neuroscience is illuminating the tools and techniques that parents, educators, and mental health professionals can use to help children and teens stabilize a secure sense of self, develop new, more adaptive behaviors, and improve their learning and thriving.

Impact of Technology on Spiritual Care
Int’l Congress of Pastoral Care and Counseling, Burlingame, CA
Monday, October 19, 2015, 9am-10:30am

Human brains are wired for connection – with fellow human beings, with the divine. Modern communications technology can support of short-circuit that connection. Modern neuroscience illuminates how mindfulness and compassion, two of the most powerful agents of brain change known to science, can help us recover resonant relationships and well-being.

Change Your Brain, Change Your Life
The Neuroscience of Well-Being Open Center, New York, NY
Saturday, October 25, 2015, 10am-5:30pm

More and more cutting edge neuroscientific research is revealing that our brains are far more adaptable and resilient than previously thought. This means that, armed with the right understanding, we can judiciously use new behaviors, practices and approaches to life to “rewire” some of the neural pathways in our brains, allowing us to radically change our mindset and enhance our effectiveness and happiness. In this workshop you’ll learn a number of scientifically validated techniques that harness the brain’s own mechanisms of change to: reduce stress; regain equilibrium; recover from trauma; retire the “inner critic;” deepen your self-compassion; recover from anxiety, depression, grief, loneliness, and guilt; and cultivate positive emotions. You’ll also explore how mindful awareness and reflection can help you come to clarity and discernment in decision making, and increase your capacity to take growth-enhancing risks in your life.

Change Your Brain, Change Your Life: The Neuroscience of Well-Being
New York Open Center, New York, NY
Saturday, October 24, 2015

 *Reduce stress
Regain equilibrium
Recover from trauma
Retire the “inner critic”
Deepen our self-compassion
Recover from anxiety, depression, grief, loneliness, and guilt
And cultivate positive emotions.

We’ll also explore how mindful awareness and reflection can help us come to clarity and discernment in decision making, and increase our capacity to take growth-enhancing risks in our lives.

Bouncing Back: Rewiring the Brain for Resilience and Well-Being
Arbor Seminaire, Austria
October 28 – November 1, 2015

Dealing effectively with the challenges and crises of life is the core of our resilience and well-being. Developing flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is the heart of any transformative process. Modern neuroscience is discovering how the brain encodes its strategies for coping in the first place and illuminates how we can learn to use our own self-directed neuroplasticity to rewire strategies that no longer work so well, even strengthen the structures of the brain that develop rather then derail our resilience. In this presentation, participants will learn to reverse the impact of stress and trauma, come out of anxiety, depression, addictions, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, and rewire the inner critic. Participants learn to deepen their self-compassion and empathy, connect to inner resources and to the relationships that are healthy and nourishing, and through mindful awareness and reflection discern options and make wise choices.

Mindful Self-Compassion Fall 2015
Spirit Rock Meditation Center Woodacre, CA co-taught with Jane Baraz
Thursdays, October 15-December 10, 2015, 7:00pm-9:30pm, plus 4-hour silent retreat Sunday, November 15 [note correction to Sunday] 2015, 9am-1pm. (This course is currently filled and registration is closed.)

Mindful Self-Compassion, as developed by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer, is a powerful 8-week training in empirically-supported tools and techniques that enable participants to respond to difficult moments in their lives with kindness, care, understanding, and wise action. Practices in loving kindness and compassion allow us to keep our hearts open in moments of struggle and suffering. Practices in mindfulness allow us to see our experiences and our reactions to our experiences, and ourselves as the experiencer, more clearly, discern options and make wise choices. Understanding our common humanity brings us out of isolation into connection and resources again. MSC, through discussions, meditations, and many experiential exercises, teaches practices of loving connected presence that allows us not just to feel better but to cope wisely when we are feeling bad. This course helps participants deal effectively with life’s challenges and crises while creating community and deepening practice. Participants are asked to attend all sessions of the course.

Shift Happens: Learning to Bounce Back from Disappointment, Difficulty, Even Disaster
Insight LA, Santa Monica, CA
Saturday, November 14, 2015, 10am-4pm

Dealing effectively with the challenges and crises of life is the core of our resilience and well-being. Developing flexible and adaptive strategies for coping with everyday disappointments and extraordinary disasters is the heart of any transformative process. Modern neuroscience illuminates how the brain encodes its strategies for coping in the first place and has shown mindfulness and compassion practices to be two of the most powerful agents of brain change, thus behavior change, known to science. A wise use of Buddhist contemplative practices and tools from modern relational psychology can help practitioners let go of unwholesome coping strategies and cultivate new, more wholesome ones, leading to more clarity, response flexibility and resilience, and less greed, hatred, delusion and suffering. In this daylong, participants will learn to reverse the impact of stress and trauma, come out of anxiety, depression, addictions, grief, loneliness, guilt and shame, and rewire the inner critic. Participants learn to deepen their self-compassion and empathy, connect to inner resources and to the relationships that are healthy and nourishing, and through, mindful awareness and reflection, discern options and make wise choices that lead to thriving and well-being.ctice in ways that make compassion practice immediately useful, with lasting benefits.

Bouncing Back: The Neuroscience of Resilience and Well-Being
Esalen Institute, Big Sur, CA
December 11-13, 2015

Linda Graham, MFT

Calendar Archive 2015

Calendar Archive 2015

Linda Graham, MFT